[SciPy-dev] requesting feedback on/editing of scikits wiki-page

[Alexander Schmolck]

Robert Kern <robert.kern at gmail.com> writes:

> Alexander Schmolck wrote:
>> Stefan van der Walt <stefan at sun.ac.za> writes:
>
>>> You can still license *your* part of the software under the modified BSD
>>> license.
>> 
>> My understanding is you can't if it depends on the GPLed code. You'd have to
>> write a non-GPL'ed drop-in replacement first.
>
> Your understanding is incorrect. You can combine code under a GPL-compatible but
> non-GPL license with GPLed code. The work as a whole must be distributed under
> the terms of the GPL. The readline module in Python, for example, is distributed
> under the PSF license just like the rest of Python. There is no drop-in
> replacement for libreadline (I don't believe libedit has been a drop-in
> replacement for many years, now).

Thanks for the clarification. The GPL is weaker then than I thought then,
because that means you can rewrite a GPL'ed program or library piecewise thus
eventually "liberating" it from the GPL. I am surprised that I haven't heard
of anyone doing that -- apart from the likely bad karma, it seems like a
reasonable strategy in certain cases... maybe because it's difficult to argue
that it would be really clean-room...

'as